Some propagation progress

It's been a little quiet around the blog lately, since my real-life workplace has been understaffed and there's been a lot of demands on my time. Luckily plants mostly keep growing even if you can't poke and prod them all the time. In fact, sometimes being too busy for your plants is just what they need.

In any case, I'm hoping things settle down soon and I can spend some more time with my plants (and my blog). One thing I'm always wanting to do more is propagation. I really need to mix up a big batch of media (especially since it's pygmy season), but in the meantime I do have a few ongoing propagation efforts that are proceeding well.

These seedlings are Drosera burmannii "Giant Red" (Hann River, Kimberley, WA, Australia).

D. burmannii already looking nice and red.

That algae-looking stuff in the corner of the pot is a bit odd. I've seen it on one pot before, and I suspect it's because I'm using a humidity tent so there's no airflow. These are well on their way to being hardened off though, so I hope it'll go away once the tent is off.

I suspect these will end up looking quite a bit like my D. burmannii (Humpty Doo, NT, Australia), since the locations are within a few hundred miles of each other. Still, I love D. burmannii. I'd like to get my hands on some of the green forms as well.

The Drosera sessilifolia I started at the same time is looking about the same.

I've been looking for this plant for a long time. Yay!

I'm looking forward to feeding these and watching them grow up alongside the D. burmannii. They're very closely related, even though D. sessilifolia is endemic to South America, several thousand miles from any D. burmannii populations. I think that's rad.

My prized Drosera capensis (Bainskloof) leaf cutting has taken well to its first feeding.

Really really excited about how well this cutting has developed.

It doesn't look particularly distinctive now, but I'm hoping with some more feeding (I'm almost done hardening it off) it will do some serious growing.

The water-float cutting I started at the same time (early September) has developed a couple leaves.

Now I just need a couple free days to mix up media and do some potting.

It's a bit hard to see, but it's definitely time to pot this guy up. I would love to have two healthy specimens of this plant, it's very attractive.

Finally, my Drosera madagascariensis is pretty much done flowering, and now I'm waiting for the seeds to ripen. The weight of the flower stalk has cause a lot of lean, and now the stem has a distinct wiggle.

It's got that lean.

I feel like in the future I'll be very judicious about which D. madagascariensis I allow to flower. It has been pretty stressful on the tall plant, while the shorter ones have mostly taken it in stride. Can't wait to harvest seed though!